Theses and Dissertations from UMD
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New submissions to the thesis/dissertation collections are added automatically as they are received from the Graduate School. Currently, the Graduate School deposits all theses and dissertations from a given semester after the official graduation date. This means that there may be up to a 4 month delay in the appearance of a give thesis/dissertation in DRUM
More information is available at Theses and Dissertations at University of Maryland Libraries.
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Item School Climate and Teacher Use of Strategies Linked to Bullying Perpetration and Victimization(2022) Gliese, Sara; Wang, Cixin; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Bullying in school settings is a major concern with approximately 22% of children in the U.S. experiencing some form of bullying (National Crime Victimization Survey, 2019). However, there is little to no current research specific to how teachers may play a modeling role through the behavior management strategies they use in the classroom to impact the likelihood and rate of bullying perpetration and victimization occurring among diverse middle school students. Additionally, while school climate has been linked to bullying perpetration and victimization, almost no research has examined how teacher strategies may impact school climate, which in turn predict bullying. This study sought to examine whether student perceptions of teacher use of positive (i.e., praise and reward) and punitive (i.e., yelling and punishment) strategies and school climate are linked to the likelihood and rates of bullying perpetration and victimization. In addition, it also examined whether school climate may have mediated the relationship between student perceptions of teacher strategies and bullying perpetration and victimization and whether gender and grade moderated these relations. Data were collected from 545 middle school students (Age: M = 13.12, SD = 0.76) from a diverse middle school in Southern California, using a multi-measure online survey administered at school. Students/families could opt-out of the survey. Data were analyzed following a two-part model suited for semi-continuous variables containing large numbers of zeros, with the first step being binary logistic regression with the whole sample, and the second step being linear regressions for cases with non-zero values using a victim-only sample and a perpetrator-only sample. Results of this study indicated that perceptions of punitive teacher strategies were linked to the likelihood of victimization, as well as the rates of perpetration and victimization for those who endorsed involvement. Perceptions of positive strategies were associated with the likelihood of victimization for those in their first year of middle school, but not for older students. Additionally, school climate was linked to the likelihood of both perpetration and victimization, but not rates. Lastly, school climate created a significant indirect effect when added to the models for positive and punitive strategies predicting the likelihoods victimization and perpetration, and positive strategies predicting the rates, and should be investigated longitudinally as a possible mediator. Overall, results supported the hypotheses that the strategies teachers use to manage behavior in the classroom and school climate may be linked to students’ involvement in bullying. Implications for practitioners and future work were presented.Item AN EVALUATION OF YOUTH MENTAL HEALTH FIRST AID TRAINING FOR AMERICORPS CLASSROOM EDUCATORS(2020) Ross, Ana-Sophia; Wang, Cixin; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The prevalence and severity of adolescent mental health concerns is clear. Half of youth experience a trauma/adverse event, thus significantly increasing their risk of developing mental illness. Further, suicide recently became the second leading cause of death among young people. Unfortunately, most youth do not get the mental health services they need. Schools, however, are the most likely place to provide formal or informal mental health care. Classroom educators, in particular, are most likely to be the one to refer/recommend students to formal school mental health services and they also provide informal mental health help. Despite their key role, they often feel underprepared to recognize concerning symptoms in youth and to support school mental health efforts. This mixed-methods study explored the impact of training 106 City Year AmeriCorps members in Dade County (Miami, Florida) using the Youth Mental Health First Aid (YMHFA) program. Quantitative data were collected at three points (pre, post, and two months after training) to examine whether YMHFA training equipped corps members with tools to support students’ mental health. Overall, training was associated with short-term improvements in mental health literacy, confidence and intentions to engage in providing mental health first aid behaviors, and knowledge of school based mental health providers. Notably, participants self-reported greater engagement in mental health helping behaviors in the two months after training than in the two months before training. No improvement in mental health stigma was observed, and some short-term improvements (i.e., mental health literacy, intentions to help) were not sustained at follow-up. Qualitative data generally supported quantitative findings and suggested that the YMHFA program is well-suited for classroom educators. However, the program has room to grow in ensuring it helps educators support culturally and linguistically diverse students’ mental health.Item Understanding Secondary Educators’ Knowledge of Mental Health and Their Perceptions of Their Role in Addressing Student Mental Health(2019) Ross, Ana-Sophia; Wang, Cixin; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Adolescents have significant unmet mental health needs and schools represent the most common place for youth to receive mental health services. Teachers are primarily responsible for recognizing and working with students with mental health needs. Scholarship has investigated teachers’ knowledge pertaining to signs and symptoms for mental illness and found that teachers report little confidence in their knowledge, and have difficulty accurately identifying students struggling with mental illness. Research has provided some insight into how teachers can promote positive mental health amongst their students but little is known about classroom educators’ perceptions about how they can address student mental health concerns. Thus, this qualitative study utilized thematic analysis to investigate 27 teacher/classroom educators’ perceptions about how they can help students who struggle with mental health problems. Five main themes emerged from the analysis: 1) school collaboration, 2) student support, 3) family involvement/family-school partnership, 4) school reform/systematic change, and 5) teacher professional development training. Additionally, the study also investigated educator’s knowledge of signs and symptoms of depression, anxiety, and eating disorders. Eighty-five percent of teachers were able to correctly identify depression from a vignette while all participants were able to identify an eating disorder from a vignette. This study provides insights about how to improve school-based mental health efforts, with specific attention to classroom-based educators’ role in the provision of services.Item Understanding Teacher Stress: Relations of Implicit and Explicit Coping Processes with Teaching Outcomes(2017) Kim, Margaret Jordan; Teglasi, Hedwig; Special Education; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Teacher attrition within the first three years is a growing problem in the US. The current study focuses on teacher stress from a novel perspective by assessing how teachers cope with stresses of the profession at the earliest point in their careers – during their training. Coping is defined as a transaction between a person and their environment, influenced by conscious choices and automatic processes. Research relies on explicit measures (self-report on Likert scales) to assess coping, but critics note this approach is limited and does not assess the whole process. In addition to Likert scales, this study incorporates implicit measures (narratives, the Thematic Apperception Test), to examine the implicit processes of coping. As predicted, significant correlations were identified within, but not across methods of measurement. Implicit but not explicit measures were significantly correlated with external evaluations of teacher effectiveness. Implications for coping theory and measurement are discussed.Item THE EFFECT OF TWO MENTORING MODELS ON TEACHER ATTRITION(2015) Kuhaneck, Michael Patrick; Strein, William; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This quantitative study employs Hierarchical Linear Modeling (HLM) to complete a path analysis that determines the effect of two different mentoring models on teacher attrition in a local education agency (LEA). The research focuses on 38 comprehensive public schools to determine if teacher attrition was impacted by a countywide teacher mentoring model employed from 2007 to 2012 compared to a school-based teacher mentoring program employed from 2012 to 2014. The research also assessed if these models had varying impact based on the level of the school (elementary, middle, or high), the setting of the school (urban or rural), and the poverty level of the school as measured by free and reduced meal rate. The results illustrate there was no statistically significant correlation between teacher attrition and the mentoring model employed irrespective of the level, setting, or poverty rate of the school.Item Informant Discrepancies: Understanding Differences in Parent and Teacher Ratings of Children's Executive Functions and Social Skills(2015) Albrecht, Jessica; Teglasi, Hedy; Counseling and Personnel Services; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Researchers and practitioners in the field of psychology frequently use parent and teacher rating scales in the assessment, diagnosis, and treatment of young children. However, research has shown that agreement between parents and teachers on rating scales is low to moderate. The present study examined this phenomenon, termed "informant discrepancy", for the Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Functions (BRIEF) and the Social Skills Improvement System (SSIS). Parents and teachers completed these scales for the same sample of 73 Kindergarten children. Results indicated that parent-teacher agreement was low at the scale and item levels, within-informant correlations were higher than between-informant correlations, mean differences in parent and teacher ratings may be explained by differences in the home and school contexts, and informants identified different children as having significant problems with executive functions and social skills. Implications of the findings for research and practice are discussed.Item Principal and Teacher Reports of Principal Leadership: An Examination of Congruence and Predictive Validity(2015) Green, Meghan Rebecca Finney; Strein, William O; Counseling and Personnel Services; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Principals influence school characteristics including morale and teacher turnover, but the utility of different methods of measuring principal behavior is unclear. Using data from public schools in the National Study of Delinquency Prevention in Schools, I examined relations between school-level teacher reports and principal self-reports of leadership, which better predicted student-reported rule clarity and fairness, and whether agreement or congruence between reports of principal leadership predicted school morale, organizational focus, and teacher turnover. The data used are from 263 schools and thousands of respondents; limitations of the study include the measures of principal leadership used, which are not strictly parallel and the age of the data used. I hypothesized that correlations between teacher and principal reports would be small and positive, that teacher reports of leadership would better predict rule clarity and fairness, and that congruence between reports would predict better school morale, better organizational focus, and lower teacher turnover.Item THE RELATOINSHIP BETWEEN TEACHER PERCEPTIONS OF AUTONOMY IN THE CLASSROOM AND STANDARDS BASED ACCOUNTABILITY REFORM(2012) Sparks, Dinah; Malen, Betty; Croninger, Robert; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Over the past 30 years, standards based accountability reform (SBA) has taken hold in public education. SBA reform includes defined academic expectations, curricula standards, measureable assessments, and performance accountability. SBA impacts multiple levels of public education. Its most recent federal codification, the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act, includes sanctions meant to influence what happens in classrooms. Historically, teachers have held a great deal of control over the activities in the classroom. Research suggests that teacher control (i.e. autonomy) over the classroom often resulted in uneven implementation of reform policies across schools, the transformation of policies to fit existing practice or the insulation of classrooms altogether from policy reform. To achieve its stated goals, SBA seeks to influence teacher and school practices, particularly where students fail to meet performance goals. This study examines the intersection of teacher perceptions of autonomy and SBA reforms, including NCLB. The study uses four waves of nationally representative Schools and Staffing Survey data from 1993-94 to 2007-08 to investigate changes in teacher autonomy over time and to examine specific school and teachers characteristics associated with changes in autonomy in 2007-08. Over-time findings reveal that teachers perceived lower classroom autonomy between 2003-04 and 2007-08. Across all four waves of data, the variation in teachers' classroom autonomy increased, and more of this increased variation occurred between schools rather than within schools. Findings for 2007-08 reveal that teachers who taught in elementary schools or taught tested subjects perceived lower levels of autonomy than did teachers in secondary schools or who taught non-tested subjects. Further analyses based on state application of adequate yearly progress (AYP) sanctions revealed a differential effect on teacher autonomy for Title I schools and for schools that failed to make AYP. Findings from this study suggest that although NCLB targets Title I schools, teachers in all schools perceive lower autonomy based on the grade level and the subject matter taught, and that state policies regarding NCLB may lead to uneven or unintended effects on teacher perceptions of autonomy in the classroom.Item Influence of Student Problem Behavior and Teacher Tolerance on Student Grades(2010) Bruckman, Katherine; Gottfredson, Gary; Counseling and Personnel Services; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The current study examines the influence of student problem behavior (as rated by teachers), teacher disposition to tolerate problem behavior, and interaction effects on student grade point average, reading grades, and math grades. The sample includes 3rd through 5th grade students (N = 12,993) and their classroom teachers (N = 562) from 45 schools. Multilevel models, with students nested within classrooms, test the influence of student problem behavior and teacher tolerance on student grades. Results imply that problem behavior negatively influences grades for students at each grade level, controlling for standardized academic achievement and other student and classroom-level covariates. Results also indicate that low teacher tolerance predicts higher current student grades in some analyses. Finally, tests for interactions of teacher tolerance with student problem behavior indicate that 5th grade students rated as having extreme problem behaviors receive lower grades in classrooms with more tolerant teachers, and higher grades in classrooms with less tolerant teachers.